34 Further Cont. Jane Eyre Read By Stephanie Poppins

Jane Eyre is a woman with a difficult past. Her childhood was at Gateshead Hall, where she was emotionally and physically abused by her aunt and cousins. Her education was at Lowood School, where she gained few friends and role models and suffered privations and oppression. Then she arrives at Thornfield and meets the inimitable Mr Rochester...

In this episode, St John refuses to give up on his mission to press Jane into joining him. Jane meanwhile, writes to Mrs Fairfax, desperate for news of Mr Rochester.

Transcript

This is S.

D.

Hudson Magic Jane Eyre Chapter 34 Further Continued Perhaps you think I had forgotten,

Mr.

Rochester Reader,

Amidst these changes of place and fortune.

Not for a moment.

His idea was still with me because it was not a vapour sunshine could disperse,

Nor a sand-traced effigy storms could wash away.

It was a name graven on a tablet,

Fated to last as long as the marble it inscribed.

The graving to know what had become of him followed me everywhere.

When I was at Morton,

I re-entered my cottage every evening to think of that,

And now at Morehouse I sought my bedroom each night to brood over it.

In the course of my necessary correspondence with Mr.

Briggs about the will,

I had enquired if he knew anything of Mr.

Rochester's present residence and state of health,

But as St.

John had conjectured,

He was quite ignorant of all concerning him.

I then wrote to Mrs.

Fairfax,

Entreating information on the subject.

I had calculated with certainty on this step answering my end.

I felt as if it would elicit an early answer.

I was astonished when a fortnight passed without reply.

But when two months wore away,

And day after day the post arrived and brought nothing for me,

I fell a prey to the keenest anxiety.

I wrote again.

There was a chance of my first letter having missed.

Renewed hope followed renewed effort.

It shone like the former for some weeks.

Then,

Like it,

It faded,

Flickered.

Not a line,

Not a word reached me.

When half a year wasted in vain expectancy,

My hope died out,

And then I felt dark indeed.

A fine spring shone around me which I could not enjoy.

Summer approached.

Diana tried to cheer me.

She said I looked ill and wished to accompany me to the seaside.

This St.

John opposed.

He said I did not want dissipation.

I wanted employment.

My present life was too purposeless.

I required an aim.

And I suppose by a way of supplying deficiencies,

He prolonged still further my lessons in Hindustani,

And grew more urgent in requiring their accomplishment.

And I,

Like a fool,

Never thought of resisting him.

I could not resist him.

One day I had come to my studies in lower spirits than usual.

The ebb was occasioned by a poignantly felt disappointment.

Hannah had told me in the morning there was a letter for me,

And when I went down to take it,

Almost certain the long-looked-for tidings were vouchsafed to me at last,

I found only an unimportant note from Mr.

Briggs on business.

The bitter check had wrung from me some tears,

And now as I sat poring over the crabbed characters and flourishing tropes of an Indian scribe,

My eyes filled again.

St.

John called me to his side to read.

In attempting to do this,

My voice failed me.

Words were lost in sobs.

He and I were the only occupants of the parlour.

Diana was practising her music in the drawing room,

Mary was gardening.

It was a very fine May day,

Clear,

Sunny and breezy.

My companion expressed no surprise at this emotion,

Nor did he question me as to its cause.

He only said,

We will wait a few minutes,

Jane,

Till you are more composed.

And while I smothered the paroxysm with all haste,

He sat calm and patient,

Leaning on his desk,

And looking like a physician watching with the eye of science an expected and fully understood crisis in a patient's malady.

Having stifled my sobs,

Wiped my tears,

And muttered something about not being very well that morning,

I resumed my task and succeeded in completing it.

St.

John put away my books and his,

He locked his desk and said,

Now,

Jane,

You shall take a walk and with me.

I will call Diana and Mary.

No,

I only want one companion this morning and that must be you.

Put on your things,

Go out by the kitchen door,

Take the road towards the head of Marsh Glen.

I will join you in a moment.

I know no medium.

I never in my life have known any medium in my dwellings with positive hard characters,

Antagonistic to my own,

Between absolute submission and determined revolt.

I have always faithfully observed the one up to the very moment of bursting,

Sometimes with volcanic vehemence into the other,

And as neither present circumstances warranted,

Nor my present mood inclined me to mutiny,

I observed careful obedience to St.

John's directions and in ten minutes I was treading the wild track of the Glen,

Side by side with him.

The breeze was from the west.

It came over the hills,

Sweet with scent of heath and rush.

The sky was of stainless blue,

The stream descending the ravine swelled with past spring rains,

Poured along plentiful and clear,

Catching golden gleams from the sun and sapphire tints from the firmament.

As we advanced and left the track we trod a soft turf,

Mossy fine and emerald green,

Minutely enamelled with a tiny white flower and spangled with star-like yellow blossom.

The hills,

Meantime,

Shut us quite in,

For the Glen towards its head wound to their very core.

Let us rest here,

Said St.

John,

As we reached the first stragglers of a battalion of rocks guarding a sort of pass,

Beyond which the beck rushed down a waterfall,

And wherest a little further the mountain shook off turf and flower,

Had only heath for raiment and crag for gem.

Where it exaggerated the wild to the savage and exchanged the fresh for the frowning,

Where it guarded the forlorn hope of solitude and at last refuge for silence.

I took a seat.

St.

John stood near me.

He looked up at the pass and down the hollow,

His glance wandered away with the stream and returned to traverse the unclouded heaven which coloured it.

He removed his hat to let the breeze stir his hair and kiss his brow.

He seemed in communion with the genius of the haunt.

With his eye he bade farewell to something.

And I shall see it again,

He said aloud,

In dreams when I sleep by the Ganges,

And again in a more remote hour when another slumber overcomes me on the shore of a darker stream.

Strange words of a strange love.

An austere patriot's passion for his fatherland.

He sat down.

For half an hour we never spoke,

Neither he to me nor I to him.

That interval passed.

He recommenced.

Jane,

I shall go in six weeks.

I have taken my berth in an East India men,

Which sails on the 20th of June.

God will protect you,

For I have undertaken his work,

I answered.

Yes,

Said he.

There is my glory and joy.

I am the servant of an invaluable master.

I am not going out under human guidance,

Subject to the defective laws and erring control of my feeble fellow-worms.

My king,

My law-giver,

My captain,

Is the all-perfect.

It seems strange to me that all round me do not burn to enlist under the same banner,

To join in the same enterprise.

All have not your powers,

I said,

And it would be folly for the feeble to wish to march with a strong.

I do not speak to the feeble or think of them,

He said.

I address only such as are worthy of the work and competent to accomplish it.

Those are few in number and difficult to discover.

You say truly,

But when found,

It is right to stir them up,

To urge and exhort them to the effort,

To show them what their gifts are and why they were given,

To speak heaven's message in their ear,

To offer them direct from God a place in the ranks of his chosen.

If they are really qualified for the task,

Will not their own hearts be the first to inform them of it?

I felt as if an awful charm was framing round and gathering over me.

I trembled to hear some fatal word spoken which would at once declare and rivet the spell.

And what does your heart say?

Demanded St.

John.

My heart is mute,

My heart is mute,

I answered,

Struck and thrilled.

Then I must speak for it,

Continued the deep,

Relentless voice,

Jane,

Come with me to India,

Come as my helpmate and fellow labourer.

The glen and sky spun around,

The hills heaved,

It was as if I had heard a summons from heaven,

As if a visionary messenger like him of Macedonia had announced,

Come over and help us.

But I was no apostle,

I could not behold the herald,

I could not receive his call.

Oh,

St.

John,

I cried,

Have some mercy.

I appealed to one who,

In the discharge of what he believed his duty,

Knew neither mercy nor remorse.

He continued,

God and nature intended you to be a missionary's wife.

It is not personal but mental endowments they have given you.

You are formed for labour,

Not for love.

A missionary's wife you must,

You shall be.

You shall be mine,

I claim you,

Not for my pleasure but for my sovereign service.

I am not fit for it,

I have no vocation,

I said.

He had calculated on these first objections,

He was not irritated by them.

Indeed,

As he leaned back against the crag behind him,

Folded his arms on his chest and fixed his countenance,

I saw he was prepared for a long and trying opposition,

And had taken in a stock of patience to last him to its close.

Resolved,

However,

That the close should be conquest for him.

Humility,

Jane,

Said he,

Is the groundwork of Christian virtues.

You say right that you are not fit for the work.

Who is it fit for,

Or who,

That ever was truly called,

Believed himself worthy of the summons?

I,

For instance,

Am but dust and ashes.

With St.

Paul I acknowledge myself the chiefest of sinners,

But I do not suffer this sense of my personal vileness to haunt me.

I know my leader,

That he is just as well as mighty,

And while he has chosen a feeble instrument to perform a great task,

He will,

From the boundless stores of his providence,

Supply the inadequacy of the means to the end.

Think like me,

Jane,

Trust like me.

It is the rock of ages I ask you to lean on.

Do not doubt,

But it will bear the weight of your human weakness.

I do not understand a missionary life,

Said I.

I have never studied missionary labours.

There,

He replied,

Humble as I am,

I can give you the aid you want.

I can set your task from hour to hour,

Stand by you always,

Help you from moment to moment.

This I could do in the beginning.

Soon,

For I know your powers,

You would be as strong and apt as myself and would not require my help.

But my powers,

Where are they for this undertaking?

I do not feel them.

Nothing speaks or stirs in me when you talk.

I am sensible of no light kindling,

No life quickening,

No voice counselling or cheering.

Oh,

I wish I could make you see how much my mind is at this moment like a rayless dungeon,

With one shrinking fear fettered in its depths,

The fear of being persuaded by you to attempt what I cannot accomplish.

Reviews

Oh, I decidedly don’t like him now… missionaries are my least favorite. I truly hope he can’t persuade her! Such eloquent writing and reading though!❤️🙏🏼